Electric Mail > Customer Supply and Group Services > July/August 2008



		Managing sustainability in ICT The recent appointment of John Campion as Executive Director, Sustainability, has seen an increased focus on sustainability issues throughout ESB. A major ICT Group sustainability initiative was to commission Gartner to undertake a green 'Information & Communications Technology' (ICT) scorecard. This is a new service from Gartner, who are a leading ICT advisory company. The scorecard measures how energy is consumed within an organisation and what can be done to reduce the negative impact of ICT on the environment. Many organisations are finding it difficult to keep ICT costs down while meeting the increasing demands of their customers. The results of the scorecard were presented at a green ICT workshop on May 29th. This session was attended by John Campion, Brid Horan, Executive Director, Customer Supply & Group Services and by staff with responsibility for IT and sustainability issues in the Business Units and ICT Group. The aim of the study was to assess our overall green efficiency against a peer group of similar organisations across three main headings: Corporate Strategy. Policies. Execution. In terms of strategy and policies, ESB are better positioned than the peer group. However, Gartner reported that the implementation of sustainable ICT measures needs to be improved. From an overall perspective, ESB are on a par with the peer group. ICT Group CIO, Peter O'Shea said that ICT Group are taking steps to ensure that environmental and CO2 implications are taken into account when decisions are being made about ICT services and infrastructure. Peter outlined a number of initiatives that are underway addressing this agenda, including: The introduction of SharePoint, which will reduce the growth in demand for storage. A print management strategy that aims to replace current printers, scanners and copiers with consolidated, power efficient multi-function devices. A web-based meetings proof of concept. Technologies that can power on and power off inactive PCs at pre-set times (i.e when not in use for long periods), saving on power consumption. ESB is already one of the leading users of server-virtualisation technology in Ireland, which reduces the number of physical servers needed and the CO2 footprint produced. Peter also discussed the Smart Metering project, which has several benefits for the National Sustainability Agenda and will be fully supported by ICT Group. In summary, this study ensures that ICT Group and Business Units understand the impact of ICT from an environmental perspective and will facilitate ICT Group working with the Business Units to minimise ESB's ICTrelated CO2 footprint.		Pictured (l-r) Paul Sullivan, Colm Bolger, Mark Connolly and Anne O'Connor take a break at the workshop. Pictured (l-r) Owen Wilson, Jim Fitzpatrick and Brian Dowd at the workshop.

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